CONTRIBUTION TO NATIONAL LIFE	165
additional sum of several millions is sent in the form of
private remittances by European Officers, drawing their
salaries from Indian Revenues; and this remittance increases
as the employment of European Officers increases in India.''
Romesh Dutt also drew attention to the Public Debt of
India. "When the East India Company ceased to be rulers
of India in 1858, they had piled up an Indian Debt of
70 millions", Roinesh Dutt stated. "They had in the
meantime drawn a tribute from India, financially an unjust
tribute, exceeding 150 millions, not calculating interest.
They had also charged India with the cost of Afghan wars,
Chinese wars, and other wars outside India. Equitably,
therefore, India owed nothing at the close of the Company's
rule; her Public Debt was a myth; there was a considerable
balance of over 100 millions in her favour out of the money
that had been drawn from her." He went on to point out
how the 70 million Public Debt in 1858 doubled to 140
millions by 1877, and how by 1900 it had risen to 224
millions. "The history of the Indian Debt,'* he concluded,
"is a distressing record of financial unwisdom and injustice,
and every impartial reader can reckon for himself how
much of this Indian Debt is morally due from India."
This was a powerful indictment, the facts of which had
hitherto been concealed from the Indian public in a maze
of arguments about the alleged "growing prosperity" of
India under British rule. It was Romesh Dutfs contribu-
tion to the resurgence of India that he placed before his
countrymen a true picture of the economics of British admi-
nistration in India. From the over-assessment of the Indian
peasantry to the ruin of her industries, the drain of public
wealth from India and the mounting Public Debts incurred
net in her interest but to finance wars abroad, Romesh Dutt
painted a picture which contributed substantially to an